Abstract
An introduction is given to scientific principles including the laws of thermodynamics and the differences between natural laws, hypotheses, and theories. The concept of geologic time is introduced with examples given of the age of the Earth, the time it takes for climate to change, and examples from the geologic record. Scientific notation is described with examples from very large and very small numbers. Some of the jargon used by climate change scientists is defined. Some early scientists are named from Pliny the Elder to Karl Popper along with their main contributions. Chaos theory is introduced as is the “butterfly effect.” The concept of multiple working hypotheses is explained.
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Farmer, G.T., Cook, J. (2013). Scientific Principles. In: Climate Change Science: A Modern Synthesis. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-5757-8_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-5757-8_2
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